“Squirrels’ forgetfulness” in the cinema – That little bit of dementia – Culture

Around 1.6 million people in Germany suffer from dementia. In short, this is a progressive deterioration in mental abilities, caused by deposits in the brain, the cause of which is unknown. Initially, the short-term memory is mostly affected, the sick repeat what has already been said, forget keys, no longer know where their bike is; later words are forgotten, people, parts of the biography. And it’s not just memories that are lost – everything that made a person disappear gradually disappears, or at most only flashes. The process takes years and is often associated with vehement aggression or depression. Another challenge in the company is that the sense of hygiene is lost and control over bodily functions is lost.

Without privately organized care from abroad – mostly from Eastern Europe – many relatives of dementia sufferers would be in a fix. More or less experienced women and men with often only a rudimentary knowledge of German and a life of their own at home, which they leave because of lack of money, come, are organized by agencies that take a lot of money for several months, often sleep in abandoned children’s rooms Working around the clock and doing a backbreaking job for little money. That is the reality, for which there is now a new German movie, by the directors Nadine Heinze and Marc Dietschreit: “The forgetfulness of the squirrels”, a kind of cheerful, dreamy dementia comedy with well-known actors.

The problems start with Emilia Schüle playing the main role, a young Ukrainian named Marija, who has to leave her son with her mother and go to Germany to earn a little bit of money as a carer. Schüle is so pretty, young and petite that she would have been advised to go to Paris or Milan to try her luck as a model. But of course this is a film, and in the film one should probably forget that nurses should ideally be able to hold a person with dementia, for example while showering. Okay, but let’s keep it simple: this is a film.

The problems continue with the way Günther Maria Halmer plays the dementia patient. Dementia is divided into three phases, in the initial phase there is no need for care. Small mistakes are made, but a lot can still be covered over. The patient in the film seems to be in the middle phase. Some things are still possible, others seem to cause such difficulties that the daughter hires a 24-hour nurse. Curt, the name of the dementia patient in the film, lies in bed a lot, has problems with bowel movements, gets lost and can no longer live alone. But whatever Günther Maria Halmer is playing – it is not a person with dementia.

If that is dementia, dementia is children’s carnival

His demeanor is far too confident, the way he walks too confident. There is no question, no slight doubt in his look that would betray his uncertainty. Is he heading for the right door right now? Did he give the correct name? Is it really winter right now? Julianne Moore had that slight concern in mind after every sentence she said in Still Alice. Whether it also fit, whether it wasn’t another mistake. Dieter Hallervorden was able to show in Til Schweiger’s really touching hit film “Honig im Kopf” the horror that a world that one no longer understands can trigger in someone. This loneliness and forlornness.

Günther Maria Halmer, on the other hand, walks briskly through his house. This man is up to things. When he wants to go out, he puts on an elegant hat. Of course, he makes mistakes with little things. But in his eyes it is mischievous. If that is dementia, dementia is children’s carnival.

Anna Stieblich and Fabian Hinrichs can be seen in other roles, sometimes playing so over the top as if they had got lost in a splatter genre film. They are Curt’s children, the caregiver immediately goes on terms, the son alternately wants to marry them or yells at them, and that happens in the film as surprisingly as in this summary. You just don’t understand.

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The biggest problem with the film, however, is its unwavering insistence on the laws of logic, even within the thinking of a person suffering from dementia. Dementia has nothing to do with logic. B is no longer followed by A, but the melody of this disease consists of surprising jumps, dissonances and an insane number of repetitions. But Curt believes he recognizes his dead wife Marianne in Marija and, just like the old doer, stages a renewed engagement with her. As if people with dementia wanted to re-enact something from the past – or: could. As if their brains would allow them to invent dramaturgically stringent stories based on a miniature mistake. Yes, what would that be nice.

There is no trace of truth in this film, no matter how hard you look

And so the shockingly stupid script, which comes from the directors, lets dementia sufferers proclaim such psychological insights as: “I’m sorry, Marianne, that I was never interested in your things.” Or: “I should have been there for you more.” Now that he believes his deceased wife is back, he wants to make up for everything he missed earlier, wants to clean up his past. How cute.

To refer again to “honey in the head”: It is absolutely possible to have dementia appear in a comedy for the whole family without glossing over the disease, mocking those affected or softening the sad side effects. In “The Forgetfulness of the Squirrels” however, dementia is simply used as a funny script idea.

The title of the film refers to the true fact that squirrels cannot find all the nuts they bury to hibernate. Curt ponders this once when he sees a squirrel from his bed on the terrace. Nature may have arranged it very well that the animals starve to death in this way, he says sadly. But Marija knows how to comfort him: This is how trees grow the following year, she explains.

A sick person longs for death, and the consolation should be that death belongs to nature, that something passes away and, as a result, something new arises. But what would arise from Curt’s death? Transferred to film, this parable means: nothing. But it sounds meaningful. As if there was a deeper meaning, as if this film wanted to say something. German film editors love something like that, a kind of deeper truth that unfortunately cannot be found here. There is no trace of truth in this film. This film is a stupid fairy tale.